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& B a k e r , Syn, Fil., p. 3 3 4 .— M c K e n , Ferns of Natal, p. 19.
— M il d e , Fil. Eur. et Atl., p. 1 8 .— W il l iam so n , Ferns of
Kentucky, p. 35, t. iv.
Polypodium vulgare, var. Americanum, H o o k e r , FI. Bor. Am., ¡¡., p. 2 5 8 .
— T o r r e y , FI. N. Y ., ü., p. 484.
Clenopteris vulgaris, N ew m an , Hist. Brit. Ferns, p. 42.
Polypodium Virginianum, L in næ u s , Sp. Pl., p. 1545. — S w a r t z , Syn. Fil.,
p. 3 4 .— W il ld en ow , Sp. P L , v ., p. 1 7 4 .— P u r sh , FI. Am.
Sept., ii., p. 658.
Polypodium Cambricum, L in næ u s , Sp. PL, p. 1 5 4 6 (a fo rm with pin-
n a t f d segments).
Polypodium australe, FÉE, Gen. Fil., p. 236 (the same as P . Cambricum,
but coming from Sardinia, Teneriffe, etc.).
H ab. — On rocks both shaded and sunny, and on banks, less frequently
on trunks of trees; a very common and abundant species. The
North-American range extends from the Atlantic to the Pacific, and
from the Slave River and Winnipeg Valley to the mountains of Colorado,
Arkansas, and North Carolina, and probably to those of Alabama
also. A form with acute segments (var. occidentale of Hooker) occurs
in California, Oregon, and British Columbia; but specimens of the ordinary
type have been sent from Unalaska and Vancouver’s Island, as
well as from the boundary-line of British Columbia and Washington
Territory. Throughout Europe and Northern Asia to Kamtschatka and
Jap an ; Azores, Madeira, Barbary States, and Cape Colony. Mexico
and the Hawaiian Islands are also mentioned by some authors; but the
evidence is not satisfactory.
D e s c r i p t i o n . — The root-stocks are elongated and creeping,
attaining a length of several inches, and a diameter of
à
two or two and a half lines. They are usually brauched and
more or less entangled, and commonly grow with the upper
surface exposed to the air. They are of a firm fleshy consistency
when fresh, but become hard and somewhat shrivelled
when dry. The color is greenish throughout their substance ;
but in dried specimens the surface is often white pruinose.
Scattered along the root-stock are slightly raised roundish
protuberances, with the top slightly concave. These are the
scars which mark the position of former fronds, and, as remarked
on p. 116, form one of the characteristics of true
Polypodia. The whole root-stock is covered with ovate-acuminate
brownish chaffy scales, peltately attached near the base.
The middle portion of the scales, and the slender acumination,
are often darker in color than the border, which is
irregularly erose-ciliate or denticulated.
The stalks are smooth and slender, and usually a little
shorter than the fronds they support. They are brownish at
the base, becoming green higher up, and, while tough in texture,
are very flexible. At the base they are nearly terete, but
have along each side a slightly prominent line, which, as it
approaches the frond, becomes more and more evident, and so
is gradually developed into a very narrow wing descending from
the segments of the frond. The fibro-vascular bundle is solitary
in the specimens I have examined ; but, in large fronds,
Dr. Milde has found two or three.
The frond is evergreen, sub-coriaceous, smooth : in outline
it varies from ovate to oblong-linear, and in length from half
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